Stolen Highlights

I have some thoughts brewing over a recent experience (spoiler alert: it involves driving in Haiti again...) and an enlightening spiritual parable that came of it.  So until I take the time to really put it to words to share with you, I am borrowing some material for this post.  One of my roomies, Jenna, is also keeping a blog, on which she is mainly keeping bullet points of her weekly highlights.  Jenna is here for one year working as the media specialist and volunteer coordinator.  Being that we spend a lot of time together as roommates, many of her weekly highlights also happen to be my weekly highlights.  I've picked a few of her posts to highlight some highlights for you (can I use the word "highlight" any more times in this post??) so you get an idea of some of the day-to-day and down-time things that happen around here. Follow these links to her blog to read up on some things I have been doing over the past few weeks.  Enjoy!

http://jennaclements.wordpress.com/2013/10/27/highlights-week-5/

 

http://jennaclements.wordpress.com/2013/11/03/highlights-week-6/

 

And now, some of my own recent highlights:

 

**Got to assist with suturing! Twice in two days!  Yesterday one of our staff gashed his leg while working.  I looked it over and concluded it would need stitches, a skill I have never done before.  Just as I was thinking I'd have to google "Suturing for dummies," our Haitian nurse walked into the Pharmacy.  It has been such a blessing to work side-by-side with her.  She was hired shortly after I arrived.  Obviously her skills and knowledge are essential, but it is particularly helpful to have her there to translate for me when community members come for medical attention. Anyway - sorry for the tangent - she walked in and said without missing a beat that she could do the stitches! And that she did.  I got to observe her method and assist with pulling the needle through. It sewed up real nice (sorry, I know some might be sensitive to medical descriptions so I'll spare the details).  Then today a student from the school nearby came in with a wide gash on her arm. Butterfly strips just weren't doing the trick, and I was concerned it just wouldn't stay clean or heal well if we just covered it.  So before I could even say the words, she was getting down the suture kit again. I've heard it said that things "come in threes" but for the sake of our Lidocaine supply and for keeping things uneventful, here's to hoping no one needs sewing up tomorrow! 

 

**Remember the little guy I wrote about recently? He is back in our care after being in the hospital for two weeks.  He is gaining weight, slowly but surely, as we feed him manually through an NG tube.  He really likes sucking on the bottle, but just isn't able to drink enough before tuckering out. Pray that his little body continues to grow and heal!  He'll likely be with us a few months before he is stable enough to go home with his grandma.     

 

**A personal highlight of each day - cuddling with the kiddos!  Tonight I went into the room where they were watching a movie to give medications to some of the kiddos.  Soon, I had a kid on each limb and was being kissed all over my face.  There is one kiddo here who recently had a small abscess (infection) on his arm, which just meant he got to spend some quality time in the nursing pharmacy with me a few times each day while I compressed it, drained it and stuck a cool cartoon Band-Aid on it.  Each visit ended with him getting a few little candies.  Even though his arm is all better now, he still likes to run up to me and show me the spot where it was, while informing me that he would like candy.  Sorry kid - no cut, no candy.  But he is guaranteed giant hug and big kiss! 

 

 

Children of the Promise has given permission for the posting of the photos on this site.  Photos taken of children in the care of Children of the Promise are not to be posted publicly without explicit permission given by Children of the Promise.